Forecasts, On The Eve Of The 2021Q2 Advance Release

Q2 GDP will be released tomorrow morning, and Jim will be providing his insights on the numbers. Today, the IMF released its July 2021 World Economic Outlook forecasts, which gives us and opportunity to recap where we stand.

Figure 1: GDP as reported (black), Administration FY22 forecast (blue triangle), CBO June forecast (red line), FT-IGM (light green triangle),  IMF July WEO (green x), potential GDP as estimated by CBO in July 2021 (thick dark gray line). Dates indicated denote when the forecasts were “locked down”. Source: BEA, OMB FY’22 Budget, WSJ July survey, and FT-IGM survey (June), CBO (February, July), IMF (July), and author’s calculations.

Nowcasts of Q2 GDP are 6.4% SAAR (Atlanta Fed, 7/28), 3.16% (NY Fed, 7/23), 7.2% (IHS-MarkIt, 7/28).